Residents of Donetsk and Lugansk elect local leaders in contested vote

Nov 04 2014

Nikolai Litovkin

RBTH

Over 527,000 voters have taken part in the elections of the head and parliament of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic.Soure: Valeriy Melnikov/RIA Novosti

Questions remain as to whether Russia will recognize the elections.

On Sun., Nov. 2, voters went to the polls in the self-proclaimed
Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics in eastern Ukraine to elect regional
leaders and parliaments. The elections were held in defiance of Kiev, which has
scheduled regional elections for the entire country on Dec. 7. Moscow said it
would recognize the vote, although the U.S. and the EU had asked Russia to
refrain from doing so, and the Kremlin had made no official statement as of the
end of the day on Monday.

In the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR), three candidates were
running for the position of head of the republic: the current prime minister
Alexander Zakharchenko; Yuri Sivokonenko, a member of DNR’s parliament; and
Alexander Kofman, a businessman and representative of the Yugo-Vostok
(South-East) Movement. Representatives from two political movements, the
Donetskaya Republika (Donetsk Republic) and Slobodniy Donbass (Free Donbass)
were vying for seats in the local parliament.

Competing for the position of head of the Lugansk People’s
Republic (LNR) was the current leader Igor Plotnitskiy, head of the Federation
of Trade Unions Oleg Akimov, LNR Minister of Health Larissa Ayrapetyan and
entrepreneur Viktor Penner. Members of the political movements Mir Luganshchine
(Peace for Lugansk), Lugansk Economic Union and the People’s Union were running
for parliamentary seats.

Any resident of the regions over the age of 16 could take part
in the elections. Fifty-one international observers were also present in the
regions on election day, including representatives from Russia, Serbia
Montenegro and France.

According to Roman Lyagin, representative of the central
election committee of the DNR, by mid-day, more than 500,000 people had cast
their votes in the DNR and 300,000 in the LNR – 300,000. Refugees from Donetsk
and Lugansk living in camps in the Russian regions bordering Ukraine were also
able to vote in the elections.

On Nov. 3, Zakharchenko was declared the overwhelming winner in
the DNR and Plotnitskiy won the election in the LNR, with 63.8 percent of the
vote.

Lyagin told Russian news agency Interfax
that the Central Election Commission of the DNR will ask Kiev to recognize the
results of the votes.

"Kiev should come to terms with the
fact that Donbas is no longer part of Ukraine. And it is Kiev's choice whether
to recognize our elections or not," Lyagin said.

Russia’s Position

Russian authorities had said before the elections that the
Kremlin would recognize the results. In a statement before the vote, Russian
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said: “The elections that will be held on Nov. 2
on the territories of the proclaimed Lugansk and Donetsk People’s Republics
will be important in terms of legitimizing their governments. We believe that
this is one of the most important sections in the Minsk agreements. We expect the elections to take place as planned, and we will
certainly recognize their results.”

The Minsk Protocol of Sept. 5 stipulated that local elections be
held in in accordance with the law of
Ukraine "about local government provisional arrangements in some areas of
Donetsk and Lugansk Regions."

EU representatives said in the
week before the vote that it did not consider the planned elections to be
consistent with the terms of the Minsk Protocol. "Early
local elections in accordance with Ukrainian law, as foreseen in the Minsk Protocol,
are the legal and legitimate means of renewing the democratic mandate of the
local authorities in these parts of Ukraine," said EU High
Representative and Vice President Federica Mogherini in a statement.

Will it
or won’t it?

Despite Lavrov’s strong statements earlier in the week, after
the elections, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying only that
it “respects
the will of the residents of southeast" Ukraine.

Alexander Konovalov, president of the Institute for Strategic
Assessments in Moscow, said that recognizing the results of the elections is
complicated for Russia. “Moscow likes the fact that in Ukraine there is an
opposition force pitted against the new authorities; that someone is exercising
independence. However, in the Kremlin, they only have a vague idea on how
further dialogue will be conducted with the new authorities of the DNR and LNR,
who are expecting a lot from their relationship with Russia,” Konovalov said.

He added, however, that he believes that Moscow will keep
providing economic support to southeastern Ukraine, including sending convoys
of humanitarian aid.

Andrei Suzdaltsev, the leading researcher at the Center for
Comprehensive European and International Studies of the Higher School of
Economics in Moscow, said that Russian authorities were walking a fine line
between supporting the elections and recognizing their results. “Russia did not
recognize, but supported the desire of the people of the southeast to express
their opinion in a referendum. The Kremlin wants guarantees that the cease-fire
holds and political dialogue to resolve the crisis continues. If Kiev violates
the Minsk agreements, then Moscow may recognize the results of the voting. This
in fact would mean the recognition of the independence of the region,”
Suzdaltsev said.

Konovalov also thinks that the elections could be used to
influence Ukrainian authorities. “Embers of the conflict will continue to
smolder, and Russia may, if need be, throw wood onto the fire. Elections in the DNR and LNR for Moscow will become a lever of political pressure on Kiev,”
Konovalov said.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko announced that he would
hold a meeting of the Ukrainian National Security Defense Council on Nov. 4 to
discuss the situation. EU representatives will also meet this week to discuss
the introduction of new sanctions against Russia.